


All For the Best

by andiemerizein



Category: Adams æbler | Adam's Apples (2005), Hannibal Extended Universe - Fandom, The Jane Austen Book Club (2007)
Genre: Awkward Flirting, Crush at First Sight, Hannibal Extended Universe, M/M, Masturbation, Religious Themes, Soccer, Tech Support, more tech support oops I'm so sorry, tentative first dates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-14
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-03-31 06:30:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13969332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andiemerizein/pseuds/andiemerizein
Summary: After recovering from his injuries, Ivan takes a sabbatical and goes to California, where he meets a cheerful, awkward,beautifultech support man who seems interested in getting to know him. Ivan finds himself rather interested in getting to know this guy, himself.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> First of all, you'll find spoilers for Adam's Apples here, since this story takes place after the movie. That said, you don't need to have seen it.
> 
> Some months back, I watched Adam's Apples and absolutely loved Ivan. I saw [this post](https://diea-kierlyn.tumblr.com/post/166028221437/wolftraptobaltimore-diea-kierlyn-who-do-we) on tumblr, which got the idea in my head that I should watch Jane Austen Book Club so that I could ponder the possibility of Grigg/Ivan myself. 
> 
> Once I watched The Jane Austen Book Club, I could not get myself to stop pondering how in the world this pairing would work. But someone seemed confident that it would! I finally started writing this thing last week after thinking about it for a good long time.
> 
> So many thanks to [JoanieLSpeak](https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoanieLSpeak/pseuds/JoanieLSpeak) and [Tirlaeyn](https://archiveofourown/users/Tirlaeyn) for listening to all my ramblings early on and providing ALL THE ENCOURAGEMENT, and Tirlaeyn and [gd_cmplx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gd_cmplx) for the betaing help!

Ivan took a number at the Help Desk and waited to see someone to get his laptop set up on the university wi-fi network with the proper security software and everything. Even though it was the beginning of summer term, he couldn’t believe how long the line was. Maybe less staff for the summer. When his number was finally called, he went to the next available technician, pulled his laptop out, and sat down. “I’ve just arrived and I’m not sure if I have all the software I need to make your network happy,” he said with a tentative smile. “Sorry, all the menus are in Danish and I don’t know how to change it”

“Not a problem,” said the kid on the other side of the desk. “You troubleshoot Windows for long enough, you know what everything is even if it’s in Chinese or Persian.” The technician had a very nice smile, and now that Ivan looked closer, it seemed he wasn’t a kid at all. He was wearing a university employee badge: Grigg Harris, career appointment, it said, while the other technicians in the room were clearly undergraduates. Mid-twenties, Ivan guessed, but he could have one of those deceptively young faces and be thirty-something. In any case, he had a head full of beautiful, shiny brown curls, the biggest, brightest blue eyes Ivan had ever seen, and outrageously pretty lips. Ivan looked away before he could be caught staring.

“How long have you been in the States?” the man, Grigg, asked with a blindingly bright smile.

“Only just about a week, I’ve just started a sabbatical from my job and I wanted to come to California while I write a book. Figured I could take some classes while I was at it. This was about the only city in the state that was remotely affordable.”

This got a laugh out of the beautiful man. “Not much to see in Sacramento, but it’s alright here. Pretty easy to drive to just about anywhere else.” Something fluttered in Ivan’s stomach and he looked down at the desk. 

“Okay, so it looks like your computer’s in good shape, I’m just going to give you the antivirus software and we can get you registered on the wifi, okay?”

“Yeah, fine.”

“Great. Do you need help with anything else while you’re here? Is your university email account set up? Do you have what you need for whatever classes you’re taking?”

“I’m sure I could handle the email, but I wouldn’t turn down help with setting it up.”

“Great. We can get you all set with that while we wait for the antivirus to run a scan here. Gives me something to do, instead of embarrassing myself with awkward chit-chat.” Grigg’s smile really was infectious, and Ivan found himself smiling back. Grigg turned his desktop monitor around and placed the keyboard facing Ivan, the browser open to a university IT registration page. “So this is going to ask you to set a password, it needs to be at least 8 characters long and include at least one capital letter, one lowercase letter, one number, and one special character such as a punctuation mark or one of these symbols, okay?” Grigg said, indicating to the top row of the keyboard, above the numbers.

Simple enough, Ivan figured, and typed a modified version of the password he’d used for his church email most recently, and confirmed it in the box below. The green checkmark signified that the system was happy, and Ivan supposed he could click the “next” button himself, but instead he used this opportunity to look up at Grigg.

“Looks like it worked, shall I click through to the next screen?” Ivan asked. 

“Great. Go right ahead. The next one’s going to ask you to select a challenge question that will allow you to reset your password if you forget it. The conventional wisdom is to select a question that only you know the answer to, but honestly most of these canned questions are things at least some of your friends and family know about you. The most secure thing is probably to set some nonsense question and answer and come here to reset your password, we’ll confirm your identity. But do what you want. Depends if you think friends and family are more likely to hack your account, or a stranger,” Grigg said with a wink.

“I’m sorry, I usually think my English is fine but that was a little fast. Could you say again?” Ivan asked, and Grigg laughed.

“Sorry, I talk a lot of shit about security practices. Ignore me and choose a challenge question and type an answer you’re going to remember. The answer is case-sensitive, just to make it even sillier.”

Ivan did so, capitalizing the last letter instead of the first. “Not worried about your job security, talking all this shit, are you?” he asked.

“Never. I’m doing these guys a favor,” Grigg leaned in and informed him conspiratorially, “they’re super understaffed for all this beginning-of-the-semester stuff so I popped in from upstairs to help out. They’re indebted to me regardless of how much shit I talk,” he went on, breaking out in that charming smile again. “All done there?”

“Yes I think so,” said Ivan.

“Great! You should be able to log into your email now. Can you go ahead and try, just so I know there’s no issues?”

Ivan logged into his email. He had 19 new messages. How that managed to happen, he didn’t know, but it worked. 

“Your virus scan is finished, it didn’t find any issues. Let’s just get you registered on our network real quick and then you’ll be good to go. Look at that, it found your MAC address automatically, so it just needs a 10-digit phone number and for you to select your operating system, and then we’ll need to wait 5 minutes and reboot.”

Ivan entered the requisite information quickly and easily, hit “register,” and wondered how he was going to pass five whole minutes sitting here in front of this beautiful man.

“Okay, great! Should work just fine when you reboot in a couple minutes. Since you’re stuck here anyway, did you have any questions about campus or the surrounding area, things about living around here in general?”

“Uh, no, I think I won’t know I have questions until situations come up where I’m not sure what to do.”

Grigg’s eyes twinkled as he let out a friendly laugh, and he reached into his shirt pocket and produced a business card, which he scribbled some numbers on. “This is my personal number, call me if you have questions about anything at all, okay? I’m happy to help outside my capacity as a temporary help desk technician. At a reasonable hour would be appreciated, but not strictly necessary.”

Ivan wasn’t sure what he was going to do with this information. He thought Grigg’s offer might be genuine, but there was also the issue he’d heard about, of friendly Californians saying things they didn’t mean to anyone they didn’t dislike. The internet could answer most any question these days, anyhow, couldn’t it? Before he knew it, Grigg was handing over the laptop, which had successfully connected to the network. Ivan packed away the laptop, pocketed the card, and thanked the beautiful man who worked upstairs who he may never see again. He could tell this was going to be a problem.

 

As Ivan made his way back across campus, intending to hit the library before going back to his apartment, he was utterly preoccupied. He was here for a sabbatical, he was meaning to make some connections with churches in the area and brush up on his English by auditing a science fiction class. Spiritual renewal, and doing something useful with himself while getting a much-needed break from the work that had just a year ago gotten him shot in the head. He did not intend to spend it pining after some younger man. 

How long had it been since he’d been attracted to anyone at all? Years. Since his wife’s passing, that’s how long. In the years following, he hadn’t really been around people enough to meet anyone worth looking at, he supposed. He imagined dating wouldn’t have been much of a priority anyhow, even if he hadn’t managed to totally isolate himself for the past 5 years. 

That might be the main reason he was blindsided by the strength of his attraction to the man who helped him today. Not only did Grigg have the prettiest face, which Ivan wouldn’t mind seeing… never mind that. Grigg also had a cheerfulness and optimism about him that Ivan had aspired to, even pretended at, for a long time, but never seemed to truly manage to achieve. Perhaps everything that had gone wrong in Ivan’s life had gone right in Grigg’s. The energy from him was refreshing, though, and Ivan wanted to soak it up. Borrow some of it. Just enough to recover from what his own play at optimism had wrought. Come to think of it, that might be a tall order, but Ivan could wish, right? It wasn’t like he was going to see the guy again. He could be a little bit enchanted today and then move on. No harm done.

A shout of “Watch where you’re going, asshole!” jolted Ivan from his thoughts as a bicyclist screeched to a halt in front of him on the sidewalk. “Jeez!” And the cyclist was gone as soon as he’d appeared. This enchantment might be a bit more dangerous than he’d first thought. Maybe he should skip the library and go home. He was jetlagged and tired. Maybe some time spent relaxing would help.

Ivan reached his tiny, sparsely-furnished studio apartment just beyond the edge of campus fifteen minutes later. He was relieved to be home after a long day dealing with the administrative details of setting up his new life. After a light dinner and the blessed distraction of his daily devotional, it was still early enough that he felt he could justify a quick nap. He laid on top of the duvet fully clothed and closed his eyes.

 

He woke up face down, duvet wrapped around him, rock hard inside his trousers and rutting against the mattress. A glance at the clock on the bedside table told him it was 2:17am. Just his luck. Go to bed for a quick nap to get through the rest of the day, wake up 9 hours later from a dream about bright blue eyes, soft curls, and sinful lips. Ivan couldn't remember the last time he'd had a sex dream, but he knew it was even longer ago than the last time he'd slept for this long.

What Ivan wanted to do was go right back to sleep. He'd already slept too long, but the alternative was being awake in the middle of the night. But he didn't want to think about the embarrassing situation that would probably result from going right back to sleep in this state. What Ivan should do was probably get up and take a cold shower, but then he'd be awake and these thoughts wouldn't truly be gone. What Ivan did was unzip his trousers, pull his underwear down far enough to pull out his cock, and take himself in hand. 

He thought about how it might feel to have the pretty mouth he'd been dreaming about wrapped around the head of his cock. He gave a light tug to feel the slide of his foreskin, imagining a perfect pink tongue teasing underneath it and blue eyes framed in thick, dark lashes gazing up at him. As he stroked himself, he imagined what it would feel like to rake his hands through those soft curls, wondered if it would make the object of his fantasy hum and moan around his cock. The friction began to border on uncomfortable and he spit into his palm before continuing, now nearing completion and imagining how it might feel to be taken deep into a soft throat, lips stretched wide around the base of his cock. That image did it for him, and his mind momentarily went blank with pleasure. It was only then that he realized he’d not had the foresight to undress more to avoid making a mess of his clothes. 

He stripped down and placed his clothes in the tote with his dirty laundry from earlier in the week. He didn’t have any quarters for the laundry, but he thought he’d noticed a change machine in the laundry room when he’d had the tour before signing his lease. He changed into sleep pants and gathered up the tote, his laundry detergent, his keys, and some cash for the change machine and headed out, hoping that he was correct in assuming the machines would be unoccupied this time of night.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More awkwardness! More IT technobabble! More geeking! More flirting! More blushing! Not sorry at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Something I maybe should have clarified in the first chapter (I'll go back through and rewrite my author's notes one of these days in an order that makes sense): This takes place *after* Adam's Apples, though you need not have seen it if you don't mind spoilers, but it takes place before/instead of Jane Austen Book Club.
> 
> Many, many thanks to [Tirlaeyn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tirlaeyn), [gd_cmplx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gd_cmplx), and [dontyoudarestiles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dontyoudarestiles/pseuds/dontyoudarestiles) for the proofreading and suggestions and such!

Grigg was not going to do it; he was not going to look up this man he just helped. That would be weird and an abuse of university IT resources. He usually didn't feel weird about looking someone up if he was curious about them, but this felt different because he'd been intrigued by this man. In a lot of ways, he was pretty normal: middle aged, athletic-looking, with longish, slightly greying hair swept to one side. In other ways, he was striking: unusually angular face, sharp cheekbones, one eye that did not track movement the way the other did. His accent was endearing, soft. Danish, the man had said. But Grigg hadn’t caught a first name. He remembered the man's username, ifjeldsted, and Grigg had a tool right at his fingertips for learning what the "I" stood for. 

He could make himself wait. If the man ever called him, like Grigg had asked him to (and hoped he would), then he'd know. And if the man didn't call, then his name was really none of Grigg's business. The end of the day arrived, mercifully, after helping at least 10 other customers at varying levels of cluelessness and exasperation, and Grigg went home, made himself a smoothie, and decided this was an evening for a bath.

If he partook of a little additional stress relief in the bath, and if his thoughts wandered more than fleetingly to a certain Dane, well, that didn't necessarily mean much, did it? Human brains do weird things.

*****

If Grigg had to hear one more complaint about classrooms not being equipped with Macbook-compatible connectors for the projectors, he was going to send a very passive-aggressive email to the entire faculty. Grigg had opinions on proprietary hardware that he tried very hard to be polite about.

A couple more minutes, and then he’d be out of here for lunch. It was the first Friday of the month, which meant a dollar off the lunch specials at his favorite shawarma place. He was straightening up his desk so he’d have a hope of finding anything on it this afternoon when his cell phone rang.

"Hello?"

"Uh, hi. Um, this is Ivan, you helped me last week with my computer and then you gave me this number."

Ivan! The man with no first name! His name was Ivan! Grigg congratulated himself for waiting instead of looking him up.

"Oh, Ivan! Uh, it’s good to hear from you! How are things? Are you adjusting to the rigorous pressures of laid-back California life?" he tried to joke. What an idiot, Grigg. Stop it.

"I have a question for you. Or rather, I have a bit of a computer emergency, and the line at the help desk is so long I'm afraid I might not have time.”

“Oh, no, what happened?”   
  
“My email is turning attachments into blank 2-kilobyte files and I have a paper due this afternoon,” Ivan explained.

The offer that Grigg had extended Ivan along with his personal phone number was a genuine one, and Grigg knew just how to fix this problem. But he’d really been looking forward to that shawarma.

"That does sound like an emergency! Well, I'm about to step out for lunch, so I think you'd better come with, and bring your laptop. I'll treat. Are you on campus? I was going to bike, but we can walk together."

“Oh, I’m so sorry to bother you, I--” he heard Ivan stammer.

"No, really, do you like Middle Eastern food? There’s this great shawarma place. Keep in mind I'm not helping you in a Help Desk capacity, so if I screw everything up, you have no one to complain to," Grigg teased.

"Well, it won’t end up worse than it is now.”

Grigg found Ivan outside the library, and they walked together to a shawarma place at the edge of campus. “This place is great. It’s cheap, the people are friendly, and they have different specials several times a month,” Grigg explained, and rattled off a few recommendations.

Once they had placed their orders at the counter, they sat down and Ivan pulled out his laptop to demonstrate what had happened to him when he’d tried to attach his paper. The file attached with no problem at all. All 127 kilobytes of it. Grigg laughed. “Classic. You ask for help with a computer problem, and the problem disappears.”

Ivan turned a bit red. “I-I’m so sorry to bother you, I have no idea why it worked, I swear it kept doing what I said it was before.”

“Oh, yeah, I'm sure you invented this problem just to see me again," Grigg suggested with a wink, causing Ivan's blush to deepen. "Honestly, I’ve seen the issue you described several times since we’ve switched to this mail client, it’s a known problem with a few possible fixes. And it's really, so common to not be able to reproduce a computer problem. Don't even worry about it, I promise.”

“Well, couldn’t you have saved yourself the time by telling me what things to try?”

“I didn’t want to overwhelm you by throwing four different suggestions at you that only some people know how to do.” Grigg began, looking down at his drink to fiddle with his straw. “And taking you out for lunch seemed a lot more fun than staying on the phone and talking you through it.” Now it was Grigg’s turn to blush.

“Fun?”

“Sure! Show off my favorite lunch place, pick on the foreign professor a little, you know,” Grigg said with a wink.

Ivan gave a little surprised look. "Let me pay for lunch, for springing this on you," he said.

"Oh, no, you don't. I said on the phone it was my treat and now your computer decides to cooperate and saved me the hassle? Not that you're a hassle,” he corrects quickly, taking a sip of his soda. “But this is nicer. We can both relax a little. What was the assignment, anyway? What are you taking?"

"I'm taking a course in short science fiction--"

"No way! I'd kill to take that class! I love sci-fi but there's plenty I haven't gotten around to reading."

"Science fiction relates tangentially to my interests, the human condition and the nature of the universe and all that. I'm mainly taking it to improve my written English, though. This week's assignment was to read a few pieces of early speculative fiction and respond to them. One takes place partially in Denmark," Ivan explained with a small smile.

"No way! What was that?"

"Somnium, The Dream, by Johannes Kepler."

Of course! What Grigg knew of Kepler and his Somnium came not first-hand, but by way of Carl Sagan’s PBS series that Grigg had loved since he was a child.

“I’ve heard of that! Never read it. I remember Carl Sagan calling it the first work of science fiction. Did Cosmos ever air in Denmark?”

“I have to say it sounds vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t tell you anything about it,” Ivan admitted.

If this guy was taking a course in short science fiction, he had to be some kind of geek, right? Grigg kind of wanted to show him Cosmos. Should he offer Ivan the DVDs to borrow? Should he invite Ivan over? Was it way too soon for that? Slow down, he reminded himself. There were probably other things to talk about.

“How’re you liking it here? Where are you staying?”

“It’s great, I like it. I’ve got an apartment a couple blocks from campus, it’s quieter than I expected so that’s nice”

“Cool! Have you explored the neighborhood at all, or are you busy with school?”   


“I’ve figured out where to go shopping, but not much beyond that. How long did it take you to get to know the area?”

Their food chose that moment to arrive, and  Grigg rambled about moving here from San Jose a year ago, when the tech startup he’d worked for had gone under. Ivan paused him periodically to ask questions, but mostly listened with polite interest while he ate. 

By the time Ivan finished his lunch, Grigg had made a dent in his, but needed to take the rest with him. 

“Where are you headed next, Ivan?” he asked.

“I think I might go home, now that my email problem is all sorted and my assignment is turned in. I’m off this way.”

“I’ve gotta get back to work, but I’m glad you called! I’ll see you around, huh? This isn’t like a favor you call in and it’s gone. The offer still stands, yeah? Call me if I can help you with anything?”

“Thank you, Grigg. Have a good afternoon at work.”

“You have a good weekend, Ivan!” Grigg called after him as they parted ways. 

On the one hand, Grigg wished he’d taken the initiative to set something up with Ivan over the weekend, but he didn’t want to scare the guy away. If Ivan didn’t call again, Grigg figured, he probably shouldn’t dwell on it.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A chance encounter, Ivan plays soccer, and the boys go on a date?!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was trying to stick to a posting schedule, but words just. wouldn't. happen. I hope it feels more substantial to you than it does to me.
> 
> I blame [this tumblr post](http://sympathyforthecannibal.tumblr.com/post/115121875051/sporty-spice-mads) for the Ivan playing soccer thing, because the photos where he's wearing the light blue jersey were taken while they were filming Adam's Appes and he looks just like Ivan and it had to happen <3
> 
> Once again, my undying gratitude to [Tirlaeyn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tirlaeyn), [gd_cmplx](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gd_cmplx), and [dontyoudarestiles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dontyoudarestiles) for the beta help!

Ivan began crossing the street in front of the grocery store with two bags in tow, walking purposefully as to get home before his ice cream melted. 

“Ivan!” a voice shouted, and he looked up to see a form in blue perched on top of a bike, whom after a moment he recognized as Grigg. Ivan hurried to the other side of the street, where Grigg had pulled out of the bike lane and onto the sidewalk.

“Hey! How’s it going?” Grigg asked. “It’s been a while, huh?”

“It’s going. Just realized after class I’ve been eating a lot of take-out lately, even though I have a perfectly functional kitchen, so...” he trailed off, indicating his grocery bag and trying not to look directly at anything below Grigg’s face, where a bright blue zip-up jersey and tight bike shorts left very little to the imagination. 

“Hey, cooking for one can be a pain, I get that.”   
  
“Yeah, I suppose it can.”   
  
“Listen, I had a really great time when we went to lunch,” Grigg started, looking down at his feet, “and I’ve been kind of thinking of calling you, but I just ran into you, so I guess I’ll ask you now!” he laughed nervously. 

Ivan’s face heated up as he forcefully dismissed his wishful thinking that perhaps Grigg was about to ask him on a date. 

“Would you want to get together again sometime,” Grigg asked, “maybe Saturday afternoon? If you’re interested, we could watch that science show I mentioned, Cosmos! Or we could do something else. You know, since cooking for one person is kind of tough sometimes, maybe we could make dinner. Do you like outdoorsy stuff? There are some hiking trails…” Grigg babbled nervously, before glancing up with a hopeful look.    
  
Ivan figured his judgment must be clouded by his attraction Grigg, who surely was just trying to strike up a friendship. That was fine by Ivan, though; he could use some friends. “I’d love to meet up this weekend. I’m actually playing soccer Saturday afternoon, you could come to my game if you like and we could go somewhere afterwards? I’m also free before my game or on Sunday afternoon.”    
  
“You play soccer! No way! I’d love to come to your game,” Grigg said, bouncing eagerly on the balls of his feet. “Where are you playing?”

“You know the intramural fields on campus?” Ivan asked, at once relieved and bewildered at Grigg’s enthusiasm.   
  
“Not especially, but I can find ‘em, that’s all online.”

“My team is playing at 1,” Ivan told him with an odd thrill.

“I’ll be there!” Grigg said earnestly. Ivan was briefly distracted, eyes drifting down Grigg’s shapely form as he got back on his bike.

“Yeah I should get home so I can get stuff in the freezer,” Ivan explained, once he snapped himself out of his admiration. “Come find me after the game on Saturday!” Ivan called after Grigg as he rode away.

On the rest of his walk home, Ivan wondered how much Grigg had noticed how flustered he’d been, or how much his eyes had wandered. He didn’t want to scare the man away; he sort of hoped this attraction would fade as they got to know each other anyhow.

_Professor_ , Grigg had called him at lunch the last time they’d seen each other. Ivan had thought briefly at the time about correcting the assumption, but he didn’t want to make Grigg think poorly of him, and he hadn’t been sure whether they’d even see each other again. Explaining that he was a member of the clergy had seemed like it would raise more questions for Grigg than it would answer, and clarifying his vocation hadn’t seemed all that important. He’d been mistaken for an academic before, and it was especially prone to happen now, given that he was taking a sabbatical, but he’d never hesitated to correct anyone before. Now that Grigg seemed to want to be friends, Ivan wondered whether he should be forthcoming about his job, at the slight risk of scaring him away, or whether he should wait and see if it came up again.

*****

Grigg had been looking forward to this for days. The first thing he’d done when he’d gotten home had been to look up where the intramural fields were--as it turned out, he’d passed them a million times. And he was excited to see Ivan play. 

He brought a blanket to sit on and a book to read in case there were any delays in the game, and parked himself far enough in sight of the field but out of the way, not far from a few others who were watching the game.

Grigg learned two things from this game: first, Ivan knew what he was doing. He seemed like a confident offensive player, maybe a little out of practice. Second, Ivan’s legs were well-muscled, powerful, and impossible to forget. Grigg was a little bit concerned he’d be thinking about those legs instead of paying attention to Ivan later. 

The game ended on a winning goal for Ivan’s team. As soon as it was finished, Ivan ran over to Grigg.

“You came!” Ivan said, breathlessly. From his position sitting on the ground, Grigg smiled up at Ivan.

“Yeah, I said I would!” Grigg said, jumping to his feet as he decided it would be best not to have Ivan’s thighs at eye-level. “Haven’t watched a soccer game since high school. You were great! So, what next? Do you want to get ice cream? I want ice cream. There’s this great place pretty close by…”

“Ice cream sounds great! Mind if we stop by the rec center so I can shower and change first?” 

“Of course!” Grigg gathered up his blanket and book and stuffed them into his backpack, then slung the backpack over his shoulder, walking alongside Ivan as they chatted idly about their respective weeks.

***

The ice cream place had a very short line as they approached it, which surprised Grigg; it was a beautiful day, if a little cooler than usual for this time of year. The lack of crowd allowed Grigg to take his time trying samples and making a decision. He ultimately had to decide between the lavender and the lemon gingersnap. Ivan forced a decision by choosing the lemon gingersnap for himself, coaxing Grigg to choose the former. 

“How did you find a soccer team to play on so quick?” Grigg asked, licking his cone before it started to drip.

“There was a poster, some people were looking to put together a league just for the summer. I’m out of practice, but I used to be pretty good, so I decided to give it a try,” Ivan said as he hoisted himself up onto a retaining wall off to the side of the small patio area.  _ Focus on the face, not the thighs, _ Grigg reminded himself briefly before hopping up to join him.

“It shows! That you’ve played a lot before, I mean.” Good save, Grigg. “I’ve never really been any good. I played for a season in high school, the JV team needed people and this guy I liked talked me into trying out,” he explained. That had been an unmitigated disaster, which he didn’t need to tell Ivan about right now.

“I used to play all the time, but about a year ago I got a head injury in an accident and lost my vision in one eye. I wasn’t sure how well I would play.”

Grigg wasn't sure if he should pry. “Well, you looked great out there,” he said, and received no comment in reply, only a shy look as Ivan took a nibble of his own ice cream.

“So you don’t play soccer,” Ivan finally said, “are there sports you do play?”   
  
“Team sports have never really been my thing, I guess. To play, I mean. I ran track and cross country in high school and college, but that was years ago. Mostly I bike a lot now.” Grigg paused to take a messy bite of ice cream that was trying to fall off the side of his cone. “It keeps me in shape and I never have to worry about parking!” 

By the time Grigg and Ivan finished off their ice cream cones, they were crowded by a group that had seemed to come out of nowhere. Grigg hopped down from the wall to throw out a wad of napkins, Ivan following close behind. 

“Listen, we mentioned cooking before, and I’d suggest going to my place, but I actually just ordered some furniture and it’s supposed to get here on Monday so maybe during the week would be a better time,” Grigg said as they walked back in the direction of campus.

“We could do that, are you gonna make me watch that science show?” Ivan asked with a smirk.

“I’m not gonna make you do anything!” Grigg really hoped Ivan was interested in at least giving it a try, though. “But I’d really…”

Ivan’s face lit up with a crooked smile. “That sounds great, I’d like to see it.”

“Tuesday then? Maybe six?” Grigg asked hopefully, imagining himself curled up next to Ivan on his new couch to watch TV, dessert in front of them. “I can email you my address and directions.”

“That works for me.”

Grigg had giddy, fluttery feelings in his stomach the whole way home. He hadn’t felt like this since he’d started dating Sean back in college. There had been dates since that breakup, some uncomfortable, a few good, but nothing substantial had ever materialized. And nothing had made him feel this way. It was exciting to think where this might lead.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some confusion to make things interesting!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god. This chapter was taking a little longer than expected, and then suddenly two weeks had gone by and I was hugging Mads at SVCC and then it was my husband's spring break and I wasn't doing much writing and it was taking me some time to get back into it and then four weeks had gone by! But I did it! Here, have a fourth chapter!
> 
> So many thanks to my darling [Tirlaeyn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tirlaeyn/) for her beta work and her endless encouragement!!!

Grigg was still giddy from his date with Ivan when his phone rang. He was about to heat up some leftovers for dinner, which he abandoned to answer the phone. It was his sister, Cat, calling from Napa where she was visiting some friends.

“Hey little brother, we still on for tomorrow?” she asked.

“Yeah, I can’t wait! I have some exciting things to tell you about."

“Ooh! You can’t tell me what’s exciting now?”    
  
“No, still sort of processing. Besides, we have  _ all day _ tomorrow, Cat, I promise. Let me know when you’re getting on the road.”

*****

Through Ivan’s visits to churches around the area, he’d struck up a few tentative friendships with local pastors and begun attending meetings for various social justice organizations with clergy he’d met. His intent was mainly investigative, to see the state of things in the U.S., but he also genuinely cared about the causes his hosts were involved with.

Ivan fiddled with his collar. He wasn’t used to wearing one without a ruff, but here in the U.S., the collar alone made his vocation more recognizable. He had been invited by a group of local pastors to join them in representing the Pride and Faith Coalition at the Pride festival today.

Seated behind the table under the tent, Ivan handed out little rainbow crosses for a while, speaking with the occasional person who decided to engage him. The booth was situated at the end of a long walkway, and Ivan looked out into the crowd and spotted what looked like Grigg, walking with a curly-haired woman in a long flowing dress. As they grew closer, it became obvious that it really was Grigg, and the woman he was with was saying something hilarious if his laughter was any indication. Ivan’s heart sank. He’d not dared to hope Grigg might be interested, and he hadn’t exactly admitted to himself yet that he was interested in Grigg, but this felt like a punch to the gut. He felt like the world was dropping out from under him. His vision blurred and he felt warm all over. He took a long drink from his water bottle as he watched Grigg and the woman approach, talking and laughing. The moment Grigg spotted him, Ivan took two deep breaths and silently reminded himself that he had nothing to be embarrassed about.    
  
“Ivan! What are you doing here? I didn’t know you were going to be at Pride! I didn’t even know if you knew about it!”

“I’m handing out these,” said Ivan with a forced smile, handing Grigg a little rainbow cross. Grigg examined it.   
  
“Okay, so I thought you were a professor, and here you are dressed like a priest, but you’re also at a booth at a gay pride event? What is this?”   
  
“I am a priest. Not here, exactly. Back home. Church of Denmark. Just helping out some friends here.”   
  
Grigg’s eyes grew wide and his mouth gaped open. He was cute when he was confused, but Ivan feared he may have some explaining to do if he wanted Grigg to be his friend. This was exactly what had kept Ivan from correcting the ‘professor’ assumption at the first opportunity.

“And your friends are…” Grigg looked at the back of the rainbow cross. “Reconciling congregations. Pride and Faith Alliance.” He looked back up at Ivan. “That’s super cool!” 

Ivan wanted to say something meaningful in response, but he was flustered and couldn’t help looking expectantly at the woman at Grigg’s side.

“It’s nice to meet you, Ivan!” the woman said, holding out a hand for Ivan to shake. “I’m Cat, Grigg’s sister.” 

It was just Grigg’s sister, not a girlfriend. For reasons Ivan could not understand, the panic from earlier resurged in Ivan’s veins at this knowledge.

“Grigg was just telling me all about you, although I wonder what else he said that was inaccurate,” she said with a wink at Grigg, who turned bright red.

“Hey! He was on sabbatical! You know who takes sabbaticals? Academics! Besides, how was I supposed to know there were priests who went on dates with men?”

“Whoa, Grigg, can we step over here and talk?” Ivan asked, suddenly questioning everything about his assumptions thus far. This may have been the wrong way to ask, because Grigg paled and looked worried. But Ivan didn’t want to draw too much attention to their conversation at the booth.   


When they had stepped off the pathway into a quieter area, Grigg began, “I took you out for ice cream after your soccer game! Oh, shit, was that not a date? I totally meant it as one but now that I think about it, I’m not sure why I even assumed you were into men! I’m so sorry, I messed this all up, we can just be friends.”

Ivan wasn’t sure what to think by now, wasn’t sure how to respond to the topic of his interest in men, considering he was so seldom interested in anyone at all, but since just being friends was as much as he could reasonably have hoped for in the first place, he figured he could be doing a lot worse. “Is that what you’d want?” Ivan asked. “I’d like that. Would you still want to go ahead with what we had planned for later this week, even if it’s not a date?”   


“Yeah, of course! I mean, as long as it wouldn’t be weird for you, we can totally still do Cosmos night. I still really want you to see it. I don’t expect you to, obviously. A lot of guys would be freaked out by this whole thi--”   
  
Ivan figured he was not freaked out in the way Grigg probably meant it, but he wasn’t sure how to clear things up. “It’s okay Grigg. Really. It doesn’t bother me a bit. We can proceed just as planned, it can just be a guys’ night if that’s what you want.”

“Sounds good. Sorry, I need some time to readjust my expectations, but I’ll get there.”   
  
The panic Ivan had felt was wearing off, but it was replaced with a low humming worry that he might be making things worse. It seemed too confusing to try to address the dating question when his perception of their situation had changed so many times in the past five minutes. Maybe this was best, for now. Just friends. No different than what he thought they were in the first place. Should be easy enough.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Development!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry for the delay! To everyone who's said anything encouraging/asked for more, especially in recent months, on here, on tumblr, on twitter, THANK YOU I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH YES YOU!
> 
> I... I blame the new girlfriend. My life has been a fanfic, I haven't needed to write any XD
> 
> Honestly, though, thanks for being so patient and kind and encouraging. Thank you thank you thank you to **wolftraptobaltimore** for being so excited about my interpretation of your idea, and to **vix-spes** for having The Most Perfect Timing (today was the deadline I'd set myself, and I can't even tell you how giggly and excited I was to wake up to that tweet on this very day oh my god)
> 
> Thanks to Tir and dontyoudarestiles for the beta!
> 
> This one's short but I hope it's worth the wait! And I hope not to take 6 months to get chapter 6 up ;)

Ivan was out the door of Grigg's house when he turned around suddenly and said, "I know you said you'd be happy to just be friends but now that I know how you've felt about me, I don't know if I can do this. It feels insincere." Grigg's face fell. Ivan wasn't sure what to say. It looked like Grigg was fighting back tears. The dozens of little signs of attraction throughout the evening flashed through Ivan's mind, and he took a chance. He stepped back into the house, into Grigg's space, and kissed him soundly on the lips.

As soon as the door was shut again, Ivan backed Grigg up against it. Grigg whimpered into the deepening kiss and ground his hips into Ivan's. Ivan pushed back, feeling Grigg's arousal. He could hardly believe that the object of his fantasies for the last few weeks was actually kissing him back. This beautiful, young, optimistic creature wanted him. Ivan grabbed Grigg's hips, which was met with enthusiastic encouragement, and after a split second of thought, he began to slowly lower himself to his knees, giving Grigg the opportunity to confirm or object before working open his belt buckle and then his jeans, and gently easing his cock out of his underwear.

"Oh, godddd, you're serious... Wait wait wait!" said Grigg, giving a gentle push to Ivan’s shoulders. Ivan glanced up, trying to gauge whether Grigg was objecting altogether or just wanting to pause. "If you do that, it’s gonna be over real quick. Let's, uh." Grigg trailed off, leading Ivan over to the couch and guiding him to lie down so that Grigg could straddle his hips.

Ivan could only watch in a state of mild disbelief as Grigg unfastened his jeans, pulled him out of his underwear and took them both in spit-slicked hand, stroking tentatively at first and then with growing confidence as Ivan became lost in the sensation. Ivan allowed his hands to wander, one into Grigg's hair, the other down his back to grip the athletic, shapely ass he'd admired in bike shorts more than once. Feeling suddenly out of breath, Ivan gave a gentle tug on Grigg's soft curls and Grigg pulled back with a gasp. Beautiful. Ivan was overcome with tenderness and admiration under Grigg’s gaze, and he almost felt as if he should say something. Ivan watched as Grigg’s eyes fluttered closed and felt the hand falter, and let out a groan as the warmth spilling over his hips and stomach sent him over the edge.

Ivan hadn’t thought he’d ever feel so content again. While he knew he and Grigg had things to discuss, he couldn’t be bothered to care much. Not with Grigg a pleasant weight on top of him, face buried in the crook of his neck, exhaling gentle breaths across his collarbone. Ivan's hand was still in Grigg's hair, now stroking gently. Grigg kissed him tenderly on the lips, wiping away a tear on Ivan's cheek, and then another.

"Will you spend the night?" Grigg asked, as if afraid to hear the answer.

"Of course," Ivan choked out, utterly overwhelmed.

***

Grigg was vacillating wildly between exhilaration and nervousness. Maybe the two feelings were not actually all that different. He wasn't certain of much right now. All he knew was, Ivan was on the other side of the wall in his shower right now. And Ivan wanted him. Ivan was apparently not straight after all. And Ivan was a priest! They still needed to talk about that. Grigg didn’t know what to make of it. The only Christianity he knew was the kind that would not go to Pride festivals. He wasn’t sure if Ivan was allowed to do what they’d just done. He thought about Googling the Church of Denmark, but really he needed to just calm down and talk to Ivan.

He heard the water shut off in the bathroom, closed his eyes, took a deep breath in and out and waited. Don’t panic, he thought. Whether this lasted or not, it’d be worth it. 


End file.
